In the present disclosure, where a document, an act and/or an item of knowledge is referred to and/or discussed, then such reference and/or discussion is not an admission that the document, the act and/or the item of knowledge and/or any combination thereof was at the priority date, publicly available, known to the public, part of common general knowledge and/or otherwise constitutes prior art under the applicable statutory provisions; and/or is known to be relevant to an attempt to solve any problem with which the present disclosure is concerned with. Further, nothing is disclaimed.
Sugarcane plants comprise stems, leaves extending from the stems, and top portions extending from the stems, usually above the leaves. The sugarcane plants are typically processed for sugar production in various stages, such as a harvesting stage and a milling stage. However, at least during such stages various inefficiencies exist.
During the harvesting stage, sugarcane harvesting machines harvest the sugarcane plants such that the stems are cut into billets, such as about six inches long, and the leaves and the top portions are separated from the stems, such as via cutting. Such type of processing is usually energy inefficient. Further, when the leaves and the top portions are separated from the stems, the leaves and the stems form an undesired biomass called field trash, which is naturally blown back into the fields from which the plants were originally harvested. Such blowback process also blows some of the billets back into the fields, which creates a sugar loss of as much as 8% per acre of sugarcane plant harvested. Although some of that blown back biomass is eventually extracted from the fields, such extraction process is usually inefficient, in some cases with about 20% of the field trash being left in the fields with the blown back billets. In addition, the field trash is frequently burned in the fields, which creates an environmental hazard or a safety hazard. Also, as the field trash becomes mixed with the billets in the fields, sugarcane trash is formed. Therefore, when the harvesting machines harvest the sugarcane plants, the harvesting machines end up picking up dirt, which is called ash, that gets mixed in with the sugarcane trash. Such processing is inefficient.
During the milling stage, the sugarcane plants are processed at a sugarcane mill such that sugar is extracted from the stems, i.e. the billets. However, the leaves and the top portions remain unprocessed due to their lack of any substantially extractable sugar, which is inefficient. Also, raw processing material delivered to the mill often contains about 80% sugarcane billets, about 18% sugarcane trash, and about 2% ash on a weight basis, when extracted under optimal weather conditions. However, when such material is extracted under suboptimal weather conditions, the ash can be about 10% of the raw material by weight, which is inefficient. Furthermore, the sugarcane trash and the ash can impede sugar production for various reasons. First, the sugarcane trash can reduce the mill's crushing capacity by about 20%, which can increase the mill's grinding season by about 20%. Second, the sugarcane trash can contain a substantial amount of starches, which, if not properly extracted, can degrade sugar output at the mill. Third, the ash, which is often substantially silica or field dirt, can create a lot of wear and tear to the mill's machinery. Resultantly, the ash needs to be filtered out during the sugar making process and such filtration process creates a loss of about 3% in the mill's sugar yield.
Accordingly, there is a need to address at least one of such inefficiencies.